meet the team
SEAE Research Leader; Executive Dean, Faculty of Education
Professor Amy Cutter-Mackenzie-Knowles
Professor Amy Cutter-Mackenzie-Knowles is a Professor of Sustainability, Environment and Education at Southern Cross University. She is the Executive Dean of the Faculty of Education and the Research Leader of the ‘Sustainability, Environment and the Arts in Education’ (SEAE) Research Centre. Professor Cutter-Mackenzie-Knowles’s research centres on climate change, childhoodnature, posthuman philosophy, and child-framed research methodologies. She is particularly focussed on the pivot points between climate, childhood, Country, and education. She has led over 40 national/international research projects and published more than 150 publications. Cutter-Mackenzie-Knowles’s most recent book is entitled ‘Posthuman Research Playspaces: Climate Child Imaginaries’ (with Rousell, Routledge).
Amy has been recognised for both her teaching and research excellence in environmental education, including an OLT Teaching Excellence Award, Citation and the Australian Association for Environmental Education Fellowship (Life Achievement Award) for her outstanding contribution to environmental education research. Amy is also the immediate past Editor in Chief of the Australian Journal of Environmental Education (Cambridge University Press).
SEAE Research Co-Leader
Professor Alexandra Lasczik
Research Interests: Professor Lasczik’s research is anchored in the integration of visual arts into education and practice. Her work explores themes of movement, climate change, philosophical inquiries, and interventions for youth at risk, employing a blend of painting, drawing, photography, poetry, walking inquiry, and creative writing.
Methodological Expertise: She is proficient in A/r/tography—a method blending art, research, and teaching to explore educational inquiries—and participatory, child-centred research methodologies. These approaches underscore her commitment to innovative and experiential learning and inquiry processes.
Industry Collaboration Interests: Professor Lasczik is interested in collaborating with educational institutions, environmental organizations, and community groups focused on youth engagement and climate action. Her interdisciplinary approach to visual arts and education positions her to contribute uniquely to partnerships that address pressing societal challenges.
Director of Higher Degree Research
Professor Liz Mackinlay
Professor Liz Mackinlay is an eclectic scholar, having experience in Indigenous education, music ethnography and feminist issues.
Chair of Discipline (Primary); Senior Lecturer; Academic Integrity Officer
Associate Professor Aspa Baroutsis
Aspa Baroutsis is a senior lecturer, researcher, and Academic Integrity Officer in the Faculty of Education. She is known for her research in: media sociology, focused on portrayals of teachers, teaching, and schools across traditional print and social media; learning engagement and student voice across mainstream and alternative school settings; and digital pedagogies and school learning spaces that support student belonging and participation.
Primary Education Course Coordinator, MTeach; Lecturer
Dr Simone Blom
Research interests: Environmental education; Science education; STEM teaching and learning; Teacher education; Creative and innovative research methodologies; Pedagogy.
Methodology: Ethnography (autoethnography and diffractive ethnography). Qualitative and transqualitative methodologies.
Industry partners: Interested in partnering with Dept. of Education, Science teachers associations, Environmental education associations and science academies.
Vice-Chancellor Research Fellowship
Dr Liberty de Rivera
Dr. Liberty de Rivera is a Vice-Chancellor Research Fellow in the Faculty of Education, specializing in the analysis and evaluation of policies within education for sustainable development, climate change, and disaster risk reduction. Her work critically explores how knowledge is prioritized or overlooked during policy transfer, a concept she frames as cognitive justice. This focus underscores her collaborations with industry partners, aiming to enhance policy effectiveness through equitable knowledge integration and recognition. Her methodology involves rigorous policy scrutiny to ensure diverse perspectives are considered in educational strategies, promoting inclusivity and sustainability.
Lecturer
Dr Sarah Crinall
Dr Sarah Crinall is a Lecturer of science childhoods, place-based relational philosophies of education and art-based methodologies. Sarah’s scholarly interests are in the power of the practical, the ethical and the ‘everyday’ and the informal learning ecologies that we live with as families and communities. Her focus is on the concept of sustenance in education, right now, during life in early years motherhood.
Honours Course Coordinator; Associate Lecturer
Dr Katie Hotko
Katie Hotko is an Associate Lecturer in Creative Arts in Initial Teacher Education. Her PhD thesis is titled “We make art and it makes us: An A/r/tographic exploration of generalist primary teachers’ creative self-beliefs.” Katie is an active member of the Sustainability, Environmental, and the Arts in Education (SEAE) Research Centre, the First Year Coordinator and Honours Course Coordinator. Katie’s passion lies in democratizing the arts, striving to make them inclusive and accessible to all.
Vice-Chancellor Senior Research Fellow
Dr Laura Rodrigues Castro
Research interests: Dr. Rodriguez Castro’s research delves into Southern knowledges, focusing on decoloniality and feminisms. She explores radical pedagogies, climate justice, rurality, and studies of memory and migration.
Methodology: She is adept in arts-based, visual, and participatory research methodologies, contributing significantly to methodological discourses.
Industry partners: Dr. Rodriguez Castro seeks collaboration with activist groups, public pedagogy entities, non-profits, and arts organisations to extend her research’s impact.
Lecturer
Dr Lisa Siegel
Lisa Siegel is a skilled environmental educator with over 20 years’ experience in developing and facilitating educational experiences for children, young people, and adults, having worked in both public and independent schools in three different countries.
Research Associate
Dr Laura Rodrigues Castro
Helen is an experienced secondary teacher and environmental educator. Her early career as a science, biology and health teacher eventually lead to working with community and non-government organisations (Landcare, Greening Australia, Victorian Schools’ Garden Awards) as an environmental/sustainability educator, where she has been involved in curriculum writing and project management as well as supporting schools with environmental projects.
Research Associate
Dr. Chantelle Bayes is a creative writer and researcher with interests spanning multi-species communities, posthumanism, contemporary and Australasian literature, the philosophy of knowledge-making, and environmental humanities. Her research delves into urban entanglements, examining how imaginaries shape our understanding of urban nature and prompting reconsideration of city life as an interaction with more-than-human entities. Bayes holds a Graduate Certificate in Higher Education and is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy-UK.
Her methodological approach is characterized by arts-based methods, research creation, ecophenomenology, econarratology, non-representational methods, ecocriticism, and place-based, embodied praxis.
Bayes is keen on collaborating with organisations focused on improving more-than-human care and employing creative arts for environmental education. She is particularly driven to enhance urban living to foster ecological and social justice.
Dr Chantelle Bayes
Research Associate
Dr Yaw Ofosu-Asare
Yaw Ofosu-Asare’s research focuses on decolonisation, African philosophy, and design education, aiming to integrate indigenous identities into African design curricula. He critiques colonial legacies while advocating for community-driven, culturally authentic pedagogies that revalorize indigenous knowledge. Methodologically, he employs postcolonial theory, storied ethnography, and participatory research methods, which facilitate deep engagement with decolonisation complexities and promote community involvement.
Ofosu-Asare seeks industry collaborations in design, education, and technology to merge indigenous knowledge with modern design practices, aiming to create sustainable educational curricula. He is especially interested in enhancing digital literacy and improving online learning environments through thoughtful design principles.
Shaping futures, one decision at a time
Ms Adrienne (Adi) Brown
Casual Academic (Teaching)
Adrienne (Adi) Brown is a visual artist and has been lecturing in Creative Technologies for over 15 years in Aotearoa and more recently in China. She is currently a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Education exploring what walking methodology brings to visual arts practice and pedagogy in higher education.
Dr Aidan Coleman
Senior Lecturer
Dr Aidan Coleman is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Education and also teaches in the Associate Degree of Creative Writing. His research and scholarship spans Australian literature, Shakespeare, poetry, ecocriticism and creative writing. He is the co-author of a series of Shakespeare textbooks and his poetry volumes have been shortlisted for national literary awards. Aidan has extensive experience as a secondary English and history teacher, and faculty coordinator.
Dr Lynda Hawryluk
Course Coordinator Associate Degree of Creative Writing
Lynda is a practising writer and qualified secondary English teacher. She lectures and teaches in writing units focused on writing and reading practices, poetry for advanced level students.
Dr Maia Osborn
Research Assistant
Maia is deeply passionate about place-responsive pedagogies as a means to cultivate environmental consciousness and ecological understanding.
Dr Kate Steele
Associate Lecturer
Dr Steele’s research interests include creative writing practice and creative writing practice in Education; the gothic; Australian literature and gender studies. She writes contemporary mystery and crime novels, often with a dash of the gothic and predominantly local settings that tap into both the whacky sense of humour and darker undercurrents, in Australian life.
Ben Roche
Human Geographer
As a human geographer, Ben Roche is passionate about participatory approaches to sustainable development and the role that education and engagement can play in creating resilience, capacity and well-being in communities. He has taught, researched and practised in the areas of community-based learning, participatory planning, sustainable development and community engagement.
Adjunct Professor Rita Irwin
Adjunct Professor
Rita Irwin is an artist, researcher, and teacher deeply committed to the arts and education. Her research interests have spanned in-service art education, teacher education, socio-cultural issues, and curriculum practices across K-12 and informal learning settings.
Adjunct Professor Keith Skamp
Associate Lecturer
Keith Skamp’s areas of specialisation are science and environmental/sustainability education and research methodology and Keith lectured in undergraduate and graduate units for many years in these areas. Keith was involved in the professional development of primary and secondary teachers at state, national and international levels for many years.
Dr David Rousell
Adjunct Researcher
David Rousell began his career as an internationally-recognised artist before moving into academia to further pursue his teaching and research interests. David brings 20 years of professional experience as an interdisciplinary artist to his academic roles, including exhibitions, installations, performances and film screenings in public galleries and performance spaces all over the world.
Adjunct Associate Professor Kim Snepvangers
Adjunct Professor
Kim Snepvangers (PFHEA) is an Adjunct Professor at Southern Cross University and a leader in creative ecologies, partnerships and arts-based research practice, with a particular interest in working with Cultural Mentors in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander studies.
Adjunct Senior Lecturer Marianne Logan
Adjunct Senior Lecturer
Marianne’s approach to research (and teaching) is to interrogate and advance socioecology and posthumanism within a science education context, where classical science education is disrupted, and new paradigms are promoted, within the current critical period surrounding climate change.
Adjunct Senior Lecturer Angela Turner
Adjunct Senior Lecturer
Angela Turner’s research is positioned under the umbrella of Design and Technologies education, specifically food education, sustainability and food innovation research (regional foods and food education research).
Adjunct Associate Professor Judith Wilks
Adjunct Associate Professor
With a Geography background, Judith Wilks worked for many years as an Environmental Planner. Judith’s current research interests include successful transitions to higher education for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, online teaching methodologies in higher education, active environmental education approaches such as child-friendly cities, and participatory methodologies for children and young people.
Adjunct Lecturer Marilyn Ahearn
Adjunct Lecturer
Marianne’s approach to research (and teaching) is to interrogate and advance socioecology and posthumanism within a science education context, where classical science education is disrupted, and new paradigms are promoted, within the current critical period surrounding climate change.
Adjunct Professor Tracey Bunda
Adjunct Professor
Professor Bunda has an outstanding track record of teaching and research, specialising in the areas of Indigenous education and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander studies. Her career in universities expands over 3 decades during which time she has held senior Indigenous leadership roles which have focused on the building the profile of Indigenous education.
External Associates
Ms Elisabeth Barratt Hacking
University of Bath
Ms Hacking’s research interests relate to childhood and environment and children’s participation and she has published widely in the fields of environmental education and education for sustainability. She has been involved in numerous educational research, evaluation and development projects for many years, mostly with schools, students, teachers and leaders.
Dr Sally Birdsall
The University of Auckland
Before her appointment as a Lecturer in Primary Science, Sally taught at various intermediate schools in Years 7 and 8 and in primary schools from Years 1 to 6. She has always been interested in science and while teaching was responsible for science in schools. As part of Sally’s Master of Education, she completed a research project into an aspect of environmental education.
Dr Ali Black
University of the Sunshine Coast
Dr Ali Black is an innovative arts-based and narrative researcher. Her research and scholarly work seeks to foster connectedness, community, wellbeing and meaning-making through the building of reflective and creative lives and identities. Ali is a highly regarded early childhood specialist who lectures into the Education Programs at USC.
Professor Susan Edwards
Australian Catholic University
Professor Susan Edwards is Director of the Early Childhood Futures research program in the Institute for Learning Sciences & Teacher Education, Australian Catholic University. Her group investigates the role of play-based learning in the early childhood curriculum for the 21st century.
Mr David Sobel
Antioch University of New England
Mr Sobel was co-founder of the Harrisville Children’s Centre in Harrisville, New Hampshire, and has served as a publicly elected school board member in Nelson and Harrisville, New Hampshire. He has served as a staff development and science curriculum consultant to schools in New Hampshire and Vermont and has been a guest speaker and workshop leader for a variety of school and environmental organisations.
Professor Margaret Somerville
Western Sydney University
Professor Somerville is Professor of Education and the Director of the Centre for Educational Research in University of Western Sydney’s School of Education. She is also the Chair of the Greater Western Sydney chapter of the United Nations Regional Centre of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development (one of only four in Australia).
Dr Peta White
Deakin University
Dr White has been a long-term activist in the environmental education field. She is currently a member of the Australian Association of Environmental Education (AAEE). She is a life-time member (and past president) of the Saskatchewan Outdoor and Environmental Education Association (SOEEA) and winner of the 2011 Melanson Award for Outstanding Contributions to Environment and Outdoor Education.
Professor Dilafruz Williams
Portland State
Dilafruz Williams, PhD, is a professor of Leadership for Sustainability Education. She has authored more than 50 chapters, journal articles, and curriculum resource guides and has given more than 100 invited lectures, symposia, and/or conference papers.
Associate Professor Sandra Wooltorton
University of Notre Dame
Sandra comes from Noongar country in South West Western Australia. She joined Notre Dame University as Director of Nulungu Research Institute in January, 2015. Sandra has worked at different times as a teacher, an education officer, and a lecturer/researcher in WA and the NT.